Mid-month tidbits

The final edit on my short story, "Leech Lake," is almost complete, and the story is almost ready to be sent into the world to find a home.

The ethereal fantasy short story I was working on is not going as well. There's still something missing . . . something I can't quite put my finger on. It's still in first draft form.

And, as usually happens, while I was swamped, trying to finish two drafts and a revision for a deadline, a new story popped into my head. I tore myself away from the other stories for a few moments and wrote a rough draft/outline for the interloper story. I'll come back to it after I finish the current two and see if it is worth continuing on, or if it should go in the "maybe someday this will be a story" file.

Don't forget to check out my latest published stories:

"Lard-Ass Larson" is available in the "August Augmentations" issue of SNM Horror Magazine;

"Homeland Security" will be available in the collection, "A High Shrill Thump" from Third Flatiron Publishing on September 1st.

And, last but not least: two pictures to share. The first is my new puppy, who's now 4 1/2 months old.

Roscoe Pascal

Momma's little hellhound

And this is a picture of one of my kids, on her way to a "Creatures of the Night" party. She does her momma proud:

Momma's little carnivore

Now go read something creepy, and I'll see you next month.

August Update

Although I'm hoping to bring the blog back to at least a weekly posting schedule (instead of this pitiful monthly posting schedule), I don't see that happening this month. I'm currently juggling three stories (two in the drafting stage and one in revision), and two of the three have looming deadlines. Ah well, perhaps next month the once-a-week format will return (unless I actually get off my tuchus and get back to work on revising the novel).

On the publication side of things, I have two new releases:

"Lard-Ass Larson" is available in the "August Augmentations" issue of SNM Horror Magazine;

"Homeland Security" will be available in the collection, "A High Shrill Thump" from Third Flatiron Publishing on September 1st.

Be sure to check them out!

Summer and the living is easy? HA!

By some small miracle, I finished the two stories I was working on and sent them off just in the nick of time. There's nothing like a looming deadline to really amp up your productivity!

I'm almost always overscheduled, but June was the busiest month I've had in a while. I've been focusing on puppy training and making sure I get my writing done because, let's face it, job one is writing. When time comes at a premium, the writing comes first and the blog and social media have to fall like headshot zombies.

I actually have a written hierarchy (I know: it's geeky; but it appeals to the accountant in me).

In definite order of importance:
1) Writing
2) Reading
3) Writer's group
4) Main social media (blog and Twitter)
5) Second-level social media (Facebook)
6) Third-level social media (Tumblr, etc.)

The month of June saw all of them suffer. I even missed a writer's group meeting!

So what's in store for July? Probably more of the same chaos, but at least I'm not going to be trying to write two brand new stories by the end of the month.

I have one short story that I want to revise/polish and get sent out for a July deadline, and a story I'm thinking about writing for an August deadline. Meanwhile, I have ten stories submitted that I'm waiting to hear back on.

So maybe July will actually be a slow month!

"Crazy Busy" is the new normal

In spite of life being crazy busy with the new puppy, I managed to get my zombie fairytale story polished and sent off well before the deadline.

My next project will be a little different: this time, the monsters are your neighbors. I'm currently working on a short story about middle America and its reaction to "the war on terror." The anthology I'm targeting closes at the end of the month, so I'm crunched for time . . . again. Good thing I do my best work under pressure.

The presentation I gave on writing horror seemed to go over well with our local writing group. I think everyone had fun exploring their dark side. Eventually I might turn these presentation into some sort of ebook for writers.

I also found a new well of creative inspiration: prompts on Twitter. I set up Hootsuite to collect any tweets that come through with the hashtags: "writingprompt" and "prompt," so now I have a stream in Hootsuite that's exclusively prompts (though the occasional complaint about friends who are chronically late occasionally shows up in the stream). If you find yourself staring at the blank page, you might want to check out those tags!

Now I've got a whole slew of prompts waiting to spark my muse . . . I just have to make the time to use them!

~ ~ ~
Recently finished reading:



The Year's Best Fantasy and Horror


The Zombie Survival Guide, by Max Brooks

Currently Reading:



The Help, by Kathryn Stockett

New addition

Although I did great for the whole first part of the month of Story-A-Day May, the last week was a bust. I think I got a story done for the last Monday of the month, but nothing for the rest of that week. Oh well, there's always next year.

Part of the reason the last week was so busy was because we were preparing for a big anniversary weekend. We planned on spending the evening at the casino in Hankinson on Friday (our anniversary), coming back Saturday, and then taking my parents fishing on Sunday. And we did all that . . . with a slight addendum.

Every time we go south, it's become a tradition to stop in Fargo and play with the puppies at Great Pets. I was especially looking forward to it this time because I lost my dog to a brain tumor a few months ago. Hubby had asked if he could get me a dog as a present for our anniversary, but I told him, "No. I'm not ready for another dog. Besides, I'll never find another dog I love as much as I loved Missy."

So, we stopped at Great Pets on Saturday, and they had a BUNCH of puppies. I decided to stop and play with one litter they'd just gotten in (about 10 pups). After I played with them a few minutes, hubby asked the storekeeper if we could take one out and play with it in the puppy area. I picked a black, block-headed looking girl pup to play with (thinking she would be the least likely one to tug on my heart strings). As the lady grabbed that one, she also grabbed another black pup. If one pup is fun, two is a blast, right?

And then something unexpected happened . . .

I fell in love with that second pup, the one I hadn't even asked to play with. Something just clicked.

And this is my new pup, Roscoe Pascal.

I really don't know how this happened. I wasn't even a dog person before my dog Missy. Now I'm a dog person, but I'm a hardcore "purebred-German-Shepard-and-always-girl-dogs" kind of dog lover. Or I was.

He's 1/4 Shar Pei, 1/4 English Bulldog, 1/4 Boxer, 1/4 Springer Spaniel (how does THAT happen?). He's jet black with four or five white hairs on his chest and a cinnamon-colored ticking on a few spots on his back. And when he looks up at you, his floppy-jowls and down-turned mouth make him look like a Grouper fish.

And I adore him!

So now I'm trying to juggle "writing time" with "puppy-time." I can't wait until he gets a little older and I can be working away on my latest manuscript in my writing room with him snoring peacefully on a blanket in the corner.

For now, though, I have to work in my writing time during his naps.

Story-A-Day Progress, Week 4

Image(s): FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Still going strong on Story-A-Day May . . . but (and I never thought I'd say this) I'm ready for some revision!

It's not that I haven't loved focusing on writing new short stories. I'm just getting impatient. I have projects I put on the back burner this month that I'm ready to get back to work on. And I'm anxious to work on revising some of the stories I've written this month.

I've had a great time with Story-A-Day May, but I'm glad it's drawing to a close.

~ ~ ~

Last week's Story-A-Day stories:

May 21st: "Spring Break" (apocalyptic horror);

May 22nd: "Jellyfish Summer" (horror);

May 23rd: "Tropical Getaway" (horror)-- I hate the title, love the story;

May 24th: "The Truth Hurts" (psychological horror)-- be glad you can't read minds;

May 25th: "Everybody Needs a Hobby" (horror).

~ ~ ~

Recently finished reading:



The Dry Grass of August by Anna Jean Mayhew


Currently reading:



The Year's Best Fantasy & Horror 2008

Special Edition: The VBA Award

I received the Versatile Blogger Award from KG Arndell, dark fantasy writer! Thanks so much, KG!

The rules of the award state that you need to nominate 15 other blogs AND tell seven things about yourself.


The 15 Blogs I pass the award on to:

1. Coffee Spoons:  Devan Burton  (http://thedlburton.blogspot.com/)

2. Electric Shock:  Nicole Easterwood   (http://niceasterwood.blogspot.com/)

3. Alex Carrick’s Blog  (http://www.alexcarrick.com/)

4. The League of Extraordinary Writers   (http://leaguewriters.blogspot.com/2012/05/wonder.html)

5. 1st BOOKS: Stories of How Writers Get Started:  Meg Waite Clayton (http://megwaiteclayton.com/1stbooks/about/)

6. L’Aussie Writer:  Denise Covey  (http://laussieswritingblog.blogspot.com/)

7. Fi's Magical Writing Haven  (http://fionajphillips.blogspot.com/)

8. Practicing Writing:  Erika Dreifus  (http://www.erikadreifus.com/blogs/practicing-writing/)

9. Kelly Hashway  (http://kellyhashway.blogspot.com/)

10. Mystery Writing is Murder:  Elizabeth Craig (http://mysterywritingismurder.blogspot.com/)

11. The Bookshelf Muse  (http://thebookshelfmuse.blogspot.com/)

12. Writing Spirit:  Julie Isaac  (http://blog.writingspirit.com/)

13. Kristen Lamb’s blog  (http://warriorwriters.wordpress.com/)

14. Jolina Petersheim’s blog  (http://www.thehappybookblog.blogspot.com/)

15. Start Your Novel (http://www.startyournovel.com/)

Congratulations!

Seven Things About Me:

1. I never learned to swim. I've learned to float (not tread water, just float) well enough I probably wouldn't die in the water, as long as I was rescued before I sunburned to a crisp. It explains why so many of my horror stories involve water.

2. I used to run a shelter for unwanted ferrets and I invented a variant of the "Duck Soup" cure for ailing ferrets--but I call my miracle cure "Beefcake" after a product Cartman uses in an episode of South Park.

3. I once had a buck charge me while I was out deer hunting. My gun was empty at the time, so I was going to turn it around and bonk him on the head with it. Luckily, it didn't come to that.

4. I worked on a road construction crew one summer, years and years ago, and I had more brushes with death that summer than I've had the entire rest of my life . . . so far.

5. I collect winged felines: cats and lions, etc., with bird wings and bat wings.

6. When I was ten or eleven, I turned the extra room in my parent's house into a nature museum, full of fossils, animal skeletons, fur and feathers, all appropriately labelled with their genus and species names.

7. I went through a Madonna-phase as a teenager (but hopefully all the photos were lost when we moved).

Thanks again for the award. We now return you to your regularly scheduled blog posts!